


The Littlest Princess

by rosesandthyme



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: a tiny bit of canon divergence, sad emotions for the actual ray of sunshine, spoilers for lategame birthright
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-28 04:01:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6314512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosesandthyme/pseuds/rosesandthyme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She did what she could to end the war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Littlest Princess

**Author's Note:**

> #spoilers for lategame Birthright (ch. 27 if I'm not mistaken). Mostly I was just so offended at this game that I wrote some emotions to deal with my loss. (also the canon divergence is the very last conversation, which I believe doesn't make sense with where the various characters are supposed to be standing at the time)

                The day Corrin left, they all returned to Castle Krakenburg in silence. Xander led the way with stone-faced impassivity, the only betrayal of his emotions the tightness in his jaw. Leo wore his anger in clenched teeth and white knuckles, his eyes distant. Camilla flew far overhead on the back of her wyvern, accompanied by her retainer, but when she had taken to the skies, Elise had seen tears streaming down her cheeks.

                That left her. Elise, the littlest princess, the most useless. Unlike Camilla, she couldn’t fly far away from her silent brothers. She trailed behind them, tiny, hiccupping sobs punctuating the oppressive quiet.

                When they got back to the castle, Leo stopped her. “Don’t cry for him,” Leo told her, his voice clipped and tense. “He betrayed us. He doesn’t deserve our sadness. Only a traitor’s death.”

                She wiped her cheeks, looking at her brother with red-rimmed eyes. “I just want to be a family, Leo. Why did this happen? Why did Corrin leave us?”

                “We’re not his real family after all,” Leo told her, and it was the most exhausted, bitter thing that she had ever heard him say.

                She nodded, biting her lower lip, trying to stop it from trembling until she was back in her room and could cry in peace for the brother that she had lost.

 

                Xander was the first to find their brother again. Corrin had simply run at the face of the crown prince, who returned to Windmire with icy anger in his eyes. Elise didn’t like her brother like this. She remembered when he had laughed, been the gentle and stern oldest brother. That was gone now, lost behind the iron curtain of war.

                Camilla was the next to find him. She came back with rends in her armor, blood staining her axe and the laughter drained out of her eyes. Leo came with her, a sneer of contempt written plainly across his features. Elise avoided both of them, letting them go to the war room to discuss with Xander. Camilla’s shouts echoed across the courtyard, but Elise just went to ask Selena if her siblings were okay.

                “Lady Camilla knew her orders were to kill,” Selena explained as she took the armor from her lady’s mount. “So what if she didn’t want to fight Lord Corrin? She never had a choice. He held back, though. Your brother’s scary when he wants to be. He could have killed her, but he didn’t. He started talking about how Garon could have killed him, with the explosion that killed the Hoshidian Queen.”

                “Do you believe him?” Elise asked, quietly.

                Selena snorted, looking at her handiwork. “I don’t think he was lying, but this isn’t my first war. Trusting your enemy is a good way to get stabbed in the back.”

                Elise visited Camilla that evening, sitting at the foot of her sister’s bed while Camilla leaned back against her headboard, midsection wrapped in bandages. Her voice was soft, completely unlike the domineering older sister Elise so admired.

                “I’m sorry, darling,” she murmured. “I wish I could have brought our brother home.”

                “It wasn’t your fault,” Elise said, and sniffed. “It’s those stupid Hoshidians who stole our brother.”

                Camilla smiled, melancholy weighing her down more than her wounds. “I don’t know what to believe, darling.”

                “Why can’t Corrin just come home?” Elise asked, her voice tiny.

                “He’s fighting a war, I’m afraid,” Camilla replied. Her eyes closed, her voice becoming very soft. “In the end, I fear either Xander will kill him or he will kill us. He’s so merciful and naïve. It’s already led him into danger so many times. I wish that I was there to keep him safe from himself.”

                Elise looked down, her fingers clenching into fists. “I don’t want our family to fight. How do I stop it?”

                “I don’t know that you can, darling.” Camilla’s answer was soft and exhausted. By the time Elise looked up again, her elder sister was asleep, purple hair haloing her. Elise stood up, and tiptoed out of the chamber.

 

                When Leo came back from his fight, Elise was thrilled. She threw her arms around his neck, almost knocking over her reedy older brother.

                “So you see! Corrin isn’t really bad after all!” She smiled at him, brilliant as the sun. “We just have to convince Xander and we can be a family again like we used to be! We don’t have to fight at all!”

                “Little sister, that isn’t how this works.” Leo looked pale and drawn, and not just from the wind being knocked out of him. “Xander isn’t going to let our brother go. We’re still at war.”

                “But you saw,” Elise said, her exuberance flickering out like a candle. “You saw that Corrin isn’t bad.”

                He smiled at her, taking her arm to lead her inside. “That doesn’t change how our father sees our brother. And Xander will never disobey Father the same way I just did. You see how Camilla is these days. She knows it’s the truth the same way I do.”

                Elise frowned, pushing back tears. She had cried enough for all of them by now. “I’ll prove you wrong,” she said, quietly. “I won’t let my family fight each other like this.”

                “Little sister, I wish you could,” Leo told her. He looked so wistful that she promised herself she would do it. For Nohr, for Camilla, for Leo. For her entire family. They couldn’t tear themselves apart like this.

 

                She found Corrin herself on one of the days that she left the silent halls of Castle Krakenburg. Her siblings hardly spoke to each other anymore; leaving was the only solace she had. That, and the reports that she got from Arthur on the war. She sent her retainer to the war councils in her place, despite the frequent berating comments from Xander that it got her.

                Elise had known it would only be a matter of time before Corrin reached Windmire, but she hadn’t expected to find him by chance in the streets of the hidden underground city. Hope flickered in her again when he agreed to attempt a parley with Xander and their father. Peace was a real possibility for a while.

                Camilla fought them to a bitter standstill. Watching her sister from the shadow of the Hoshidian army, Elise felt the first bit of doubt. Camilla had hardly left her room since her last battle with Corrin; seeing her take to the field with such a vengeance made her wonder if peace could ever be possible. Leo echoed her doubts when they crossed paths with him. She simply tightened her grip on her staff, and vowed to not let anyone get hurt. Not her family. She wouldn’t let it happen. She couldn’t.

                It fell apart when they reached Xander. Her brother and sister had been right. He would never lay down his sword and disobey their father. There was no room for mercy in Garon’s war.

                Trailing after them to the Great Hall, Elise felt the sting of tears in her eyes. “I’m so stupid.” The words were a whisper, but someone heard them.

                “Y-you’re not.” It was the soft, tremoring voice of Princess Sakura. The priestess held her bow in front of her, eyes downcast. “You… you tried to end this without fighting. That’s more than I did.”

                “But I failed,” Elise said, miserable. “My brothers are going to kill each other.”

                Sakura looked up, her eyes full of sadness. “I wish I had tried to stop the violence the way that you did. I’ve just… I’ve been watching my siblings fight all the while. I can’t do anything, either. Maybe if I had your courage, if I had tried for peace instead of being selfish and only trying to save my people, this wouldn’t have happened.”

                Elise bit her lip, looking straight ahead as Xander lashed out, driving Corrin back a step. “I can’t let them do this. There has to be a way to stop this.”

                “You tried, Elise,” Sakura said, her voice soft and sad. “People like us just aren’t made for war.”

                Tightening her grip on her rod, Elise shook her head. Then, slowly, she passed it to the other princess, her eyes bright with determination.

                “Tell my brothers not to cry, alright?” she said, and smiled at Sakura. She had a feeling that, in another life, they could have been friends. If things had worked out differently. If Corrin had come home with them, or found some other way instead of breaking his family’s hearts.

                She took a step forward, and then broke into a run.

                She wouldn’t let her family fall apart like this. There was one last thing she could do for Nohr. For her siblings. For herself, to save her fading dream of peaceful times.

                _Please forgive me._


End file.
